78 PAGAN TRIBES OF BORNEO chap. 



that it is a blood-relative, and the following myth is 

 told to account for this. A Kayan woman of high 

 class was reaping padi with her daughter. Now 

 it is against custom to eat any of the rice during 

 reaping ; and when the mother went away for a 

 short time leaving the girl at work, she told her on 

 no account to eat any of the rice. But no sooner 

 was the mother gone than the girl began to husk 

 some padi and nibble at it. Then at once her body 

 began to itch, and hair began to grow on her arms 

 like the hair of a Dok. Soon the mother returned 

 and the girl said, " Why am I itching so ^ " The 

 mother answered, " You have done some wicked 

 thing, you have eaten some rice." Then hair 

 grew all over the girl's body except her head 

 and face, and the mother said, *' Ah, this is what 

 I feared, now you must go into the jungle and 

 eat only what has been planted by human hands." 

 So the girl went into the jungle and her head 

 became like a Dok's, and she ceased to be able 

 to speak. 



The Dok does not help them in any way, but 

 only spoils their crops. A very popular dance is 

 the Dok dance, in which a man imitates very 

 cleverly the behaviour of the Dok. It is a very 

 ludicrous performance, and excites boisterous mirth. 

 They say it is done merely in fun. 



In one Kayan house the ends of all the main 

 crossbeams that support the roof are ornamented 

 with fretwork designs, which are clearly animal- 

 derivatives and apparently all of the same animal. 

 The form suggests a crocodile, and some of the men 

 agreed that that was its meaning, while others 

 asserted that it was a dog. No doubt it was 

 originally one or other of these, but has now become 

 a conventional design merely, and its true origin has 

 been forgotten. 



A pattern which seems to be derived from the 



